


Separation

by ProblematicPines



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Canon Divergence - Dipper and Mabel vs. the Future, Gen, Heavy Angst, Hurt, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Mental Anguish, Separation Anxiety, Twin Separation Anxiety
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-26
Updated: 2019-01-26
Packaged: 2019-10-16 15:09:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17552006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ProblematicPines/pseuds/ProblematicPines
Summary: Dipper was gifted; he was very intelligent for a boy his age, he had a certain charisma about him that made people want to befriend her socially-awkward brother. Of course Grunkle Ford would see great potential in the boy that Mabel didn’t quite show as prominently.She accepted that.What Mabel didn’t accept was Grunkle Ford insisting Dipper staying behind in Gravity Falls to become his loyal apprentice, and Dipper accepting without a second’s hesitation.





	Separation

Leaving Gravity Falls was hard enough on Mabel.

 

Leaving Dipper behind was even harder.

 

Mabel had enjoyed her summer vacation spent in the tiny town nestled amongst the huge, dark forests, even if it had taken a turn for the worse near the end. After bonding with her twin brother Dipper in a way only a town as magical as this could bring them together to do so, she had grown to love the place. Even with its odd residents and even odder non-human residents. Gnomes, unicorns, mermaids galore, in that town.

Mabel had loved it there for the first few months she’d stayed in the Mystery Shack with her Grunkle Stan and Dipper, and had never wanted to leave. But, like all things, summer had to end, and she and Dipper had to come home to Piedmont in California, several states away.

 

Mabel had initially assumed that the mundane life back in California would have been easier on the both of them with the other by their side; they’d been together for years, since the day they were born, and hadn’t been apart for very long at all.

Yet this summer’s end brought about a life-changing revelation that Mabel couldn’t help mulling over as she lay in her bed, staring at her ceiling of her old familiar bedroom.

 

The sudden presence of a family member neither she nor her brother had any knowledge of had brought with him a heavy tension that lingered over the Mystery Shack.

Grunkle Ford meant well - Mabel knew that. She knew that he was merely wanting the best for his grand-nephew.

Dipper was gifted; he was very intelligent for a boy his age, he had a certain charisma about him that made people want to befriend her socially-awkward brother. Of course Grunkle Ford would see great potential in the boy that Mabel didn’t quite show as prominently.

She accepted that.

 

What Mabel didn’t accept was Grunkle Ford insisting Dipper staying behind in Gravity Falls to become his loyal apprentice, and Dipper accepting without a second’s hesitation.

 

Being as close to the Author of the Journals Dipper had fawned over all summer as Dipper was, Mabel shouldn’t have been surprised, but honestly, she was shocked.

Shocked that Dipper would just throw away their sibling closeness for the sake of spending his teen years cluttered up in some basement researching some nerdy science mumbo-jumbo.

Spending time with his Grunkle was important, sure, but spending time with the person he was the closest to in the whole world should have taken priority.

 

_“You’re being selfish,” Dipper had snapped at her when Mabel had tried begging him to come back home with her to Piedmont. “I don’t want to be tethered to you all my life. Yeah, you’re my sister and all, but I wanna do what I wanna do!”_

 

_“But what about me?!” Mabel had cried, tears rushing down her cheeks. “What about what I want? What about all the time we spent together this summer? Did that not mean anything to you?!”_

 

_“Of course it did, but-”_

 

_But Mabel had already ran from the bedroom._

 

Mabel’s thoughts drifted back to the present. She was lying in her bed, her knees tucked up to her chest and her arms wrapped around her cold-skinned legs. Her sweater collar was pulled up and over her head; she was in Sweater Town.

None of the residents were there; no Mr. Dust Mote, no Miss Fuzz, nobody. Just the darkness, the texture of cotton on her cold, clammy skin and the smell of her perfume and pine. The house was unnaturally silent; before summer, Mabel had been bouncing off the walls with her boundless hyperactive energy and Dipper had been trying to get her to act more civil.

 

Now, there was total silence - her parents were asleep, as she should have been, but she had spent all night in her bed, just curled up and praying, begging that Dipper would change his mind and walk through her bedroom door at any moment, apologizing profusely for choosing a total stranger over his best friend.

But, deep down in her broken heart, Mabel knew that Dipper had made his choice, and that he was sticking with it.

 

_Which left Mabel no other choice but to have left her beloved brother behind in Gravity Falls (a town she once loved, but was now tainted with the acrid bitterness of separation), and take the bus ride home back to California._

_The day Mabel had been set to leave, she couldn’t even bear looking Dipper in the eye. She had hugged Grunkle Stan goodbye (the one person that had been wholly and blissfully neutral throughout this whole ordeal), and took Waddles with her on the bus - but Grunkle Ford and Dipper had merely been standing on the sidelines, the former’s expression unreadable and the latter staring into the ground, digging his toe into the dirt._

 

_Their 13th Birthday had been a disaster, too - after none of her friends had shown up due to previous arrangements set by the universe to torture her, Dipper had been reluctant to celebrate it while something so saddening was transpiring between the two of them._

_Mabel had celebrated it in her own little way with Grunkle Stan, by having a small party of their own in his grungy little living room while their twin counterparts did whatever-nerds-did in the basement of the Shack._

_Despite her Grunkle’s best efforts to cheer her up with badly-baked cake and cheap knick-knacks disguised as thoughtful presents, Mabel had been too despaired to even celebrate her transition into becoming a teenager._

 

_Nothing was fair._

Unfurling her stiff limbs from her sweater, Mabel swung her cramping legs over the side of her bed. Swallowing a bitter taste in her mouth, she crept over to her closet door; she unlatched it, swung open the door with a soft creak, and slipped inside, shutting it behind her.

Through the thin shutters in the wood, rays of moonlight shafted in and illuminated her clothes, which hung like dark, cloaked figures around her. Their zany and creative colours were muted by the night’s darkness, and Mabel pushed her way through them, heading towards the back of the closet.

When she bumped into the far wall (which wasn’t far at all, in fairness), she stood stock-still in the darkness, staring ahead at the wall she couldn’t see.

 

She drew her head back, then brought it forward, crashing the front of her cranium and forehead against the wall as hard as she could.

 

_SLAM!_

 

The impact made her head reel; a sharp, striking pain bloomed across her head, and she just barely choked back a cry of pain. She bit her lip to stop herself from crying. Before she had fully recovered from the blow, she drew her head back again (ignoring the wave of nausea that the motion brought), and slammed it again, this time with an even louder _SLAM_!

 

The world was upended from the dizzying blow, and Mabel couldn’t help but wince and tear up a little.

She knew that this wouldn’t help her case at all. She’d sat through the assemblies at school about how hurting yourself will only make things worse, how you should talk to somebody about your problems instead of taking them out on yourself.

But the one person she wanted to talk to couldn’t (and wouldn’t) talk to her, so this was the next best thing.

 

Mabel hit her head again, with less force this time; she was beginning to feel faint. Tears ran down her cheeks, stinging her skin and making her grimace. She pressed a palm to the front of her head, whimpering softly as the contact brought about new sparks of pain. She couldn’t feel any wetness that signified bleeding, which was both a blessing and a curse (she wanted to feel it, _really_  feel it), but there was definitely a large bump that she had to come up with a pretty good excuse for in the morning to her parents.

 

Deciding to deal with it later, Mabel staggered back out of the closet, but didn’t make it all the way to her bed - she slumped over in the middle of her bedroom, curling up on the cool carpet, bathed in ghostly moonlight. The window gaped open above her, allowing her to see the twinkling stars and the moon.

 

Mabel noticed, in her final seconds of consciousness, how fewer stars were visible in the urban sky compared to the countryside view she was accustomed to in Gravity Falls.

Before her world plummeted into darkness, she made out one particular constellation in the tiny pinpricks of twinkling light.

 

It was the Big Dipper.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a premise I've been really interested in writing for since I started writing FanFiction. I've seen so many takes on this premise from other, much-better writers, and I wanted to try my hand at it.  
> I think I did pretty well, regardless.
> 
> As always, comments and kudos are very much appreciated!


End file.
